Downtown L.A.'s problems fixable, mogul says

Developer who oversaw Grand LA assesses challenges facing the city.

- ROGER VINCENT

Downtown L.A. is doing better than you think it is, but the government needs to do more to energize the city, said one of the region's longest and most successful real estate leaders.

Bill Witte is retiring after running Related California, a large-scale developer of both luxury and low-income apartments, for more than three decades.

Among the high-profile projects he oversaw was the creation of the Grand LA, a $1-billion mega-project with housing, a hotel and restaurants designed by Frank Gehry across the street from the architect's famed Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles.

Witte founded Related California in 1989 with Stephen M. Ross, chairman of New York-based Related Cos. Related California is now one of the largest real estate companies on the West Coast with a portfolio of more than 21,000 residential units, including the Century condominium scraper in Century City, where television heiress Candy Spelling lives on the top two floors.

Related's most recent project is 700 Broadway in Santa Monica, an upscale apartment complex with a private park, a grocery store and an Equinox Fitness Club. Related is also building a housing project for lowincome families and seniors called Alveare in downtown Los Angeles's South Park neighborhood.

Witte's interest in development dates to his childhood in New York. His father was a builder, and young Witte enjoyed tramping around construction sites.

"I developed a fascination with cities," he said.

He went on to earn degrees in urban studies and urban planning from the University of Pennsylvania and broke into the field as a member of the Philadelphia planning staff in the freewheeling administration of Mayor Frank Rizzo in the mid-1970s, when the city had 25,000 abandoned housing units.